Brad Hendricks has been named as a Top 100 Trial Lawyer by The National Trial Lawyers Association. He’s also a member of the Mass Tort Trial Lawyers Association and the Business Tort Trial Lawyers Association. The National Trial Lawyers is a professional organization of America’s top trial lawyers. Membership in the organization is by invitation only and is extended to those individuals who exemplify superior qualifications, trial results, and leadership in their respective state or major geographical area. The National Trial Lawyers has evaluated Mr. Hendricks’ qualifications and extended an exclusive invitation to him based on his performance as an exceptional trial lawyer in the practice area of Civil Plaintiff law.

In 1999, the Institute of Medicine published a widely cited study called To Err Is Human. In it we learned that 98,000 people were dying every year from preventable errors in hospitals. Unfortunately, that study underestimated the number of deaths. According to a new study just out from the prestigious Journal of Patient Safety, four times as many people die from preventable medical errors than we thought, as many as 440,000 a year.

Medical errors now claim the spot as the third leading cause of death in the United States, ahead of auto accidents and diabetes. Only cancer and heart disease cause more deaths. It is likely the estimates in this new study will replace the Institute of Medicine estimates from 1999. That means hospitals are killing off the equivalent of the entire population of Pulaski County, Arkansas every year. More than a thousand people a day are dying from preventable errors.

These deaths are not from the illness which hospitalized the patient in the first place. Patients are dying from preventable errors due to a lack of emphasis on safety. These preventable errors are common and well known. A sponge left inside the surgical patient causing a massive infection. A massive medication overdose. Infections from contaminated equipment used at the bedside. Following safety rules prevents these errors.

When will it end? Society picks up the costs of these errors in the form of higher costs for hospital care. Employers lose good employees and thousands of dollars in lost productivity. Families needlessly lose loved ones. We need to insist that hospitals implement safety standards to eliminate these errors. Safety first should be a hospital’s motto.

Arguments supporting restrictions on the right to a jury trial (mischaracterized as tort or lawsuit reform) are based primarily on myths and unsubstantiated anecdotes. One of these myths is that doctors practice defensive medicine more often in states without caps on damages; therefore, caps on damages will reduce defensive medicine. A new study busts this myth.

According to a study by the Center for Studying Health System Change in the August Health Affairs, physicians’ perception of their risk of malpractice liability predicts their practice of defensive medicine. Below is the abstract of the newly released study:

Despite widespread agreement that physicians who practice defensive medicine drive up health care costs, the extent to which defensive medicine increases costs is unclear. The differences in findings to date stem in part from the use of two distinct approaches for assessing physicians’ perceived malpractice risk. In this study we used an alternative strategy: We linked physicians’ responses regarding their levels of malpractice concern as reported in the 2008 Health Tracking Physician Survey to Medicare Parts A and B claims for the patients they treated during the study period, 2007-09. We found that physicians who reported a high level of malpractice concern were most likely to engage in practices that would be considered defensive when diagnosing patients who visited their offices with new complaints of chest pain, headache, or lower back pain. No consistent relationship was seen, however, when state-level indicators of malpractice risk replaced self-rated concern. Reducing defensive medicine may require approaches focused on physicians’ perceptions of legal risk and the underlying factors driving those perceptions.

The findings of this study suggest that malpractice reforms touted for years as reducing defensive medicine, such as caps on damages, do not change how physicians practice. On the other hand, one could certainly argue that there is actually no such thing as defensive medicine. Either a test or procedure is necessary or it is insurance fraud to bill for it.

Under the Arkansas Constitution, the right to a jury trial is protected by language which says, “The right to a jury trial shall remain inviolate…”. Inviolate means untouched and undisturbed. The right to a jury trial should remain untouched and undisturbed and not subject to restrictions based on myths.

At The Brad Hendricks Law Firm, a frequent question asked by our clients or potential clients is when a person should apply for Social Security Disability benefits after becoming disabled. One myth is that an application may only be submitted when a disability has lasted longer than one (1) year. This simply is not true.

According to the Social Security Administration, you should apply for disability benefits as soon as you become disabled, bearing in mind that a disability application may take a long time to process. To apply, you must provide the following:

Your application may be expedited if you provide the following information to your local Social Security Office:

Social Security Number

Birth Certificate or Baptismal Record

Names, addresses and phone numbers for all medical providers and case workers that treated you for your disability and the dates of treatment

Medication names and dosages for all medicines taken

Medical records in your possession

Relevant laboratory and test results

A summary of where you worked and the type of work you performed

A copy of your most recent W-2 Form or your most recent federal tax return if you are self-employed

Keep in mind that additional information may be required as your application is processed.

If your application is approved, and the state agency determines, for example, that your disability began on January 15, your first benefit will be paid for the month of July. You should receive your July benefit in August.

A Word of Welcome

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DISCLAIMER ON RESULTS:

Results vary from case to case, and past success does not guarantee a favorable result in any case.